Henry Crabb Robinson, (born May 13, 1775, Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, Eng.—died Feb. 5, 1867, London) English man of letters whose voluminous diaries provide valuable information on life in the Romantic and early Victorian periods and give lively portraits of its literary personalities.

Henry Crabb Robinson, detail of an oil painting by H. Darvall; in the National Portrait Gallery, …

Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, London

Living in London from 1796, Robinson practiced law as a barrister on the Norfolk circuit (1813–28). He also served as foreign correspondent for The Times of London (1807–09) and became involved in the antislavery campaign and in the founding of the University of London. He befriended William Blake, of whose last years Robinson’s diaries give the fullest account. He also knew Charles Lamb, William and Dorothy Wordsworth, and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, of whose lectures he made notes. In Germany (1800–05) he met the leading poets and thinkers of his day, including J.W. von Goethe, Friedrich von Schiller, and J.G. von Herder; on his return to England, he was influential in making German literature and philosophy more widely known.

His diaries were first published in 1869. Collections of his correspondence with the Wordsworth circle (1927), about Germany (1929), and about books and writers (1938) were edited by E.J. Morley.

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(1775-1867). The English man of letters Henry Crabb Robinson kept voluminous diaries that have provided valuable information on life in the early Romantic period and given lively portraits of a host of its literary personalities. A journalist who led an active public life, he was well placed to record affairs in his age.